Where Sydney's cyclists are most likely to have an accident - and when

Sydney has the lowest rate of cyclists in any Australian capital city but the number of cyclists seriously injured is not falling.

In Australia and Europe, the rate of hospitalisation for people involved in a car crash has declined significantly but the reverse is true for cyclists with a 2017 study finding casualty rates were rising 8 per cent per year between 2007 and 2015.

One of the researchers involved with that 2017 study, Dr Ben Beck, said cultural attitudes toward cyclists, a lack of data about where and how many riders there are, plus properly separated cycleways are needed to reduce the casualty rate.

"We have a problem and it clearly needs addressing," said Dr Beck, who is deputy head prehospital, emergency and trauma research at Monash University. "We don’t really understand the amount of time that cyclists are spending on our roads and if this is changing over time."

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Data about the number of cyclists riding in Sydney has not been updated since early 2016 and many Sydney city bicycle counters were decommissioned in 2015. Transport for NSW was not forthcoming with recent cycleway count data.

There are two sets of data for crashes involving cyclists in NSW: those reported to police and those where someone was admitted to a hospital.

Between 2016 and April 2018 only 557 incidents where someone was seriously injured on a bike in NSW were reported to police. In a shorter period, from 2016 up to September 2017, a total of 3383 injured cyclists were admitted to a hospital in NSW.

In NSW the average age of cyclists killed between 2012 and March 2018 was 48, with the youngest seven and the oldest 79.

The 2017 National Cycling Participation Survey attributed almost all of the decline in the rate of cycling in NSW between 2015 and 2017, to fewer riders in Sydney and that is "a very big concern for us", Bicycle NSW spokeswoman Kim Lavender said.

"NSW has the lowest bike rider numbers in Australia with just 12.5 per cent of the population riding a bike once a week, which is incredibly low compared to the ACT's 26 per cent," Ms Lavender said. "Bicycle NSW is continually getting calls from our members stating a car almost ran into them."

The falling number of cyclists is a direct result of a lack of separated cycleways because, in places where they have been built, such as in the City of Sydney, the trend is positive, she said.

"Twice as many women ride in the City of Sydney (13 per cent) compared to greater Sydney (6 per cent) [and] from 2016 to 2017, the proportion of people riding in the inner city grew from 14 per cent to 20 per cent," Ms Lavender said.

In Sydney, about two-thirds of bike crashes happened at intersections between 2012 and 2016, NSW Centre for Road Safety data shows, detailed bicycle crash data is not yet publicly available for 2017.

Around peak hour both in the morning and the evening were the most dangerous times to be cycling in Sydney. Across the Sydney City LGA, 116 cyclists were injured after dark, 19 were hurt at dawn, 476 injured in daylight and another 70 riders were wounded at dusk between 2012 and 2016, a Herald analysis of NSW Centre for Road Safety data found.

During the day serious accidents were spread across a few main roads in the city with Moore Park Road, King, William and Liverpool streets the site of multiple crashes in 2015 and 2016.

Outside of daylight hours, there were more serious bicycle accidents on Oxford St in Darlinghurst and Paddington between 2015 and 2016 than almost anywhere else in the city.

The NSW Government is committed to ensuring the safety of cyclists, a Transport for NSW spokesman said.

"The provision of safe and connected bicycle networks within 10 kilometres of the Harbour CBD and emerging cities is a key focus of the Greater Sydney Services and Infrastructure Plan," the spokesman said.

"The 2017-18 NSW Budget includes a $62 million commitment to more than 150 local walking and cycling projects across the state. This funding is in addition to an $80 million reservation in Restart NSW for cycling infrastructure."

The amounts allocated by the NSW Government include walking projects and when considering there is a $5 billion roads budget, this spending on active transport is less than 1 per cent, Ms Lavender from Bicycle NSW said.

"The United Nations recommends 20 per cent of the roads budget should be dedicated to active transport modes, such as cycling, in NSW it is just 0.6 per cent," she said.

A City of Sydney spokesman said a safe bike network is increasingly important to help keep Sydney moving as it grows.

"Infrastructure Australia recently agreed that the 284-kilometre Inner Sydney regional bike network is one of the nation’s most significant infrastructure priorities," he said.

In the year to March 2018, 43 cyclists have died on the road in Australia, there were 21 fatalities in the same period last year.